ਗੁਰੂ ਅਰਜਨ ਦੇਵ ਜੀਗੁਰੂ ਅਰਜਨ ਦੇਵ ਜੀ

ਮੁੱਢਲਾ ਜੀਵਨ

Guru Arjan Dev Ji was born in 1563 at Goindval, the youngest son of Guru Ram Das Ji and Mata Bhani. As a child he was known for his gentle nature and his devotion. Sikh accounts say he spent his first eleven years at Goindval and the next seven at Ramdaspur. As a youth he lived two years in Lahore, sent by his father for a cousin's wedding and to help establish a Sikh congregation. He learned Gurmukhi and the Gurbani from Baba Buddha Ji, and the SGPC records that he also studied Persian, Hindi and Sanskrit. Historians record two marriages: to Mata Ram Dei in 1579 and to Mata Ganga in 1589, the mother of his son and successor Hargobind.

When his father tested his three sons for the succession, it was Arjan, the youngest, who proved the worthiest, and in 1581 he became the fifth Sikh Guru at the age of eighteen. His elder brother Prithi Chand never accepted the decision. Prithi Chand's followers came to be called Minas. Sikh tradition says he opposed his brother bitterly, made three attempts on the young Hargobind's life, and after the Guru's martyrdom declared himself the rightful Guru at Amritsar. The middle brother, Mahadev, had chosen an ascetic life and stood apart from the dispute.

The Harmandir Sahib

Arjan inherited a growing community centred on the new town of Ramdaspur. He threw himself into completing his father's work: the great tank, the Amrit Sarovar, was excavated and lined, and in its centre he began building the shrine that would become the Harmandir Sahib, the Temple of God, known today as the Golden Temple. Sikh tradition holds that its foundation stone was laid by the Muslim Sufi saint Mian Mir, a gesture of the Guru's universal spirit.

The Harmandir Sahib was revolutionary in its design. Unlike Hindu temples built on raised platforms, it was constructed on a level with the ground, and lower than the surrounding land, so that every visitor must step down to enter, a physical expression of humility. It was given four doors, facing all four directions, symbolising that the house of God was open to all people regardless of caste, creed or gender. Completed in the early 1600s, it became the spiritual heart of Sikhism, and Sikhs began to call the Guru Sacha Patshah, the True King, a title that unsettled the Mughal court and the orthodox clergy.

Guru Arjan Dev Ji also systematised the community's finances. He formalised the practice of Dasvandh, the contribution of one-tenth of one's income to the community, and expanded the Masand system, a network of representatives who collected offerings and spread the Guru's teaching. Under his administration the Sikh community became wealthy, organised and increasingly visible, which drew the attention of the Mughal state.

Towns and works beyond Amritsar

Guru Arjan Dev Ji founded new towns as well as institutions. In 1590 he founded Tarn Taran, near Goindval and about 24 kilometres south of Amritsar, having a great tank dug there. The name means the place that frees one from the cycle of birth and death, and beside the tank he had a house built for lepers.

He laid the foundation stone of Kartarpur in the Doaba region near Jalandhar, the City of God, in the early 1590s, and established Hargobindpur, now Sri Gobindpur, on the river Beas, naming it for his young son Hargobind. The SGPC also records a baoli, a stepwell, built by him at Dabbi-Bazar in Lahore, later destroyed under Shah Jahan and re-excavated under Maharaja Ranjit Singh, and a large irrigation well at Chheharta near Amritsar.

Did Guru Arjan Dev Ji meet Emperor Akbar?

Yes. On 24 November 1598 the Mughal emperor Akbar visited the Guru at Goindwal, a meeting recorded in the Akbarnama of Abu'l-Fazl. Akbar listened to the kirtan, walked around the commune, and ate in the langar. Enemies of the Guru had told the emperor that the new scripture maligned Islam, but when passages were read to him, Akbar was pleased. The SGPC quotes his verdict: the work was the greatest Granth of synthesis, worthy of reverence.

The visit had a political background too. After a dispute over Mughal land revenue, the revenue of the Bari doab was eased following the meeting; one account says Akbar reduced it by a sixth at the Guru's request, when the region was suffering famine.

Compiling the Adi Granth

Guru Arjan Dev Ji's greatest scholarly achievement was the compilation of the Adi Granth, the first version of the Sikh scripture, completed in 1604. Working with Bhai Gurdas as scribe, he gathered the hymns of the first four Gurus along with the compositions of Hindu and Muslim saints, including Kabir, Farid, Namdev and Ravidas, whose teachings aligned with the Sikh message. The inclusion of these Bhagats remains one of the most remarkable acts of religious inclusiveness in history. The completed volume was installed in the Harmandir Sahib with great ceremony, with Baba Buddha appointed as its first Granthi.

The compilation was also a response to rivalry. Baba Mohan at Goindval held an early collection of hymns, and Prithi Chand kept a rival collection at Guru Harsahai, while distorted hymns attributed to Guru Nanak were in circulation. By gathering the authentic compositions into one authorised volume, Guru Arjan Dev Ji fixed the scripture against corruption. His own contribution, 2,218 hymns, stands as the largest by any single author in the Guru Granth Sahib.

What is the Sukhmani Sahib?

The Sukhmani Sahib, the Prayer of Peace, is Guru Arjan Dev Ji's most loved composition. Sukh means peace and mani the jewel of the mind. Set in Raag Gauri, it runs from Ang 262 to 296 of the Guru Granth Sahib: twenty-four ashtpadis, each opening with a two-line salok followed by eight stanzas. It was composed around 1602 at Ramsar in Amritsar and first recited at Gurdwara Barth Sahib in Gurdaspur district.

It is among the most recited of all Sikh prayers, read alone or in the sangat at home or in the gurdwara. A full recitation takes an hour to an hour and a half, and Sikhs believe it brings peace to the mind and steadies the remembrance of God. Its themes are simran, the saints and the holy congregation, true devotion, the nature of the mind, the evil of slander, and the acceptance of death.

Martyrdom and legacy

The Guru's growing influence alarmed the Mughal emperor Jahangir, pressed by hostile courtiers and Prithi Chand's faction. The SGPC records that Prithi Chand allied with Sulhi Khan, a revenue officer, to harm the Guru, and that Sulhi Khan died after falling into a burning brick kiln. Then Chandu Shah, one of Jahangir's diwans, added his weight against the Guru: Sikh accounts say the Guru had refused, on the Delhi sangat's counsel, to marry Hargobind to Chandu's daughter, and that Chandu, an orthodox Hindu, opposed the egalitarian movement. In 1606 Guru Arjan Dev Ji was arrested in Lahore on charges of treason, accused of blessing the emperor's rebellious son Khusrau. Jahangir's own memoir, the Tuzk-e-Jahangiri, written on 6 June 1606, calls him a Hindu named Arjan and records the emperor's wish to put a stop to the affair.

A heavy fine was demanded and the removal of certain hymns from the Granth; the Guru refused to pay or to alter the scripture. He was handed to the Lahore governor and, Sikh tradition says, subjected to days of torture: seated on a red-hot iron plate, with burning sand poured over his blistered body, given neither food nor water. Through it all he uttered the shabad Tera kiya meetha laage: whatever you ordain appears sweet, I ask only for the gift of your Name. The Spanish Jesuit Jerome Xavier recorded that the Sikhs pleaded with Jahangir to commute the torture to a fine, and failed; the cleric Shaikh Ahmad Sirhindi publicly cheered the punishment, while the Sufi saint Mian Mir is said to have tried to intercede, though Sikh accounts say the Guru asked him not to interfere.

Guru Arjan Dev Ji died in Lahore on 30 May 1606. Scholars note that the exact manner of his death is disputed, with some accounts saying he was thrown into the Ravi river, but Sikh tradition holds him as Shaheedan de Sartaj, the crown of martyrs, the first martyr of the faith. The spot is marked today by Gurdwara Dera Sahib in Lahore's walled city.

His martyrdom is remembered each year on the 24th of Jeth in the Nanakshahi calendar as Shaheedi Diwas, widely called Chabeel Day for the free cold sweet drinks, kachchi lassi and rose sherbet, served to passersby in his memory, a symbol of coolness against the heat of oppression. Gurdwaras hold akhand paths with the bhog on the morning of the day, kirtan, langar and nagar kirtan.

The martyrdom was a turning point. The peaceful community of Nanak's followers now understood that faith might demand the ultimate sacrifice. Before his death, Guru Arjan Dev Ji is said to have instructed his son Hargobind to take up arms in defence of righteousness, a directive that led to the Sikh doctrine of Miri-Piri, the union of spiritual and temporal authority.

Guru Arjan Dev Ji gave Sikhism its scripture, its central shrine, and its first martyr. The Adi Granth he compiled became the Guru Granth Sahib, the living Guru of the Sikhs. The Harmandir Sahib he built is the most recognisable symbol of the faith. And his martyrdom set the community on the path from a devotional movement to a people prepared to defend their beliefs, a transformation completed by his successors.